Wealth of Congress
Each year since 1990, CQ Roll Call has reviewed the
financial disclosures of
all 541 senators, representatives and delegates to determine the 50 richest members of Congress. This year's report, derived from forms covering the calendar year 2013, shows it took a net worth of $7.47 million to crack the exclusive club. For the first time, we went a step further by publishing a ranking of every single lawmaker by their minimum net worth. That full list with breakdowns of members' assets and liabilities is found below.
all 541 senators, representatives and delegates to determine the 50 richest members of Congress. This year's report, derived from forms covering the calendar year 2013, shows it took a net worth of $7.47 million to crack the exclusive club. For the first time, we went a step further by publishing a ranking of every single lawmaker by their minimum net worth. That full list with breakdowns of members' assets and liabilities is found below.
Assets by type
Investments | $401.10M |
Real estate | $31.10M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $0.05M |
2.Rep. Michael McCaul
R-Texas
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #2 | $117.54M | $118.04M | $0.50M |
Previous year | #2 | $114.10M | $114.60M | $0.50M |
Change | 0 | 3.02% | 3.01% | 0.00% |
Exactly how much money McCaul and his wife have is a mystery. Several of the holdings in his wife’s name are in the broad spousal asset category of $1 million or more. On his 2011 disclosure, McCaul listed many of those same assets as being worth at least $50 million — the highest category. In that year, his wealth was estimated to be at least $305 million, and even though his wealth has been calculated closer to $100 million for the past two years, there’s no reason to believe he has any less money now than he did in 2011.
But even if some assets are being dramatically undercounted, McCaul’s wealth is still staggering — as is the number of assets listed in his wife's and children’s names. The McCaul family’s wealth is almost entirely invested in the stock market and in municipal bonds.
The family portfolio shows a wide-range of traditional stocks — AT&T, Wal-Mart, Berkshire Hathaway — as well as investments in a number of government bonds, with a special emphasis on investment projects in Texas.
Even with all the wealth, McCaul does maintain a mortgage debt of between $500,001 and $1,000,000 on his personal residence in Austin, Texas. It happens to be the only thing on his financial disclosure to which he is formally connected; it’s a joint liability with his wife.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $116.89M |
Real estate | $0.10M |
Trusts | $1.00M |
Bank accounts | $0.05M |
3.Rep. John Delaney
D-Md.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #3 | $111.92M | $113.99M | $2.07M |
Previous year | #6 | $68.35M | $70.61M | $2.27M |
Change | 3 | 63.76% | 61.43% | -8.83% |
The self-made financier is the only current member who has been a chief executive of a publicly-traded company, and he’s held that title at two businesses he created. The son of a unionized electrical worker, Delaney founded HealthCare Financial Partners as a young lawyer in 1993, which specialized in lending money to smaller medical firms. He sold his controlling interest six years later for more than half a billion dollars and used the profits to start CapitalSource of Chevy Chase, Md., which loans to small and midsize businesses that can’t get credit at good rates from bigger banks.
Although he stepped away from the bank’s day-to-day leadership before taking office, CapitalSource continues to be the principal font of Delaney’s riches. His stake in the firm, which topped $25 million the year he was elected, grew to exceed $50 million during his freshman year in the House.
A member of the Financial Services Committee, Delaney has a stake of between $5 million and $25 million in another suburban Maryland financial services firm he helped found: Alliance Partners, which specializes in helping small banks pool resources to invest in big projects. He also has investments of comparable significance in Congressional Bancshares Inc. of Bethesda, Md.; a hedge fund in San Francisco; an equity fund in New York and a money market account at Goldman Sachs. (The values of the last two assets jumped from the minimum $1 million range a year earlier.) He has smaller stakes in 16 other investment partnerships.
Delaney has more than $5 million on deposit with Wells Fargo and lesser balances at six other banks. A family trust owns stock in three dozen companies, from Airgas to Williams Sonoma. He and the trust have also purchased more than 40 different municipal bonds, about a third of them issued in Maryland.
Last year, Delaney got an influx of cash by exercising $4.7 million in CapitalSource stock options, and his wife, April, sold more than $2.5 million of her shares. The money that would have more than paid for the Capitol Hill townhouse the couple recently bought (without a mortgage). The Delaneys live in Potomac, Md., a half-hour drive from the Capitol but just outside the boundaries of the sprawling district where he spent $2.3 million of his own money to get elected two years ago.
The congressman’s only major liabilities, valued between $1 million and $5 million, are his mortgage on that house and the investment capital he borrowed from a newly formed family trust 16 years ago.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $86.69M |
Real estate | $1.55M |
Trusts | $18.96M |
Bank accounts | $6.78M |
4.Sen. Jay Rockefeller
D-W.Va.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #4 | $108.05M | $113.55M | $5.50M |
Previous year | #5 | $83.77M | $89.27M | $5.50M |
Change | 1 | 28.98% | 27.20% | 0.00% |
Rockefeller’s wealth is concentrated in three separate blind trusts: the trusts at JPMorgan and Wells Fargo are each worth at least $50 million and the third, at United National Bank in Charleston, W.Va., is worth at least $5 million. Because the highest category for disclosure is $50 million or more, Rockefeller’s assets from the JPMorgan and Wells Fargo trusts could be much higher than the minimum amount he was required to disclose. His total assets are worth at least $113 million, up from at least $89 million in 2013.
Recent transactions include the sale of property in D.C.'s Cleveland Park neighborhood by his spouse, Sharon Rockefeller. The five bedroom, 3.5 bath home was not their primary residence, and the disclosure listed a value of at least $1 million. Sharon Rockefeller also owns more than $1 million in PepsiCo corporate securities stock, and she received compensation of more than $1,000 for serving on PepsiCo’s board.
Rockefeller listed only two liabilities on his disclosure form. The first is a 1998 demand loan from United National Bank in Charleston, W.Va., worth at least $5 million. The second is a 2013 mortgage worth at least $500,000 in Sharon Rockefeller’s name. The mortgage for a New York City apartment as detailed on previous years' forms. It was previously worth at least $1 million, indicating the Rockefellers have paid down part of it.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $7.93M |
Real estate | $0.00M |
Trusts | $105.25M |
Bank accounts | $0.37M |
5.Sen. Mark Warner
D-Va.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #5 | $95.13M | $95.13M | $0.00M |
Previous year | #3 | $96.31M | $96.31M | $0.00M |
Change | -2 | -1.22% | -1.22% | 0.00% |
After taking a job out of law school as a fundraiser for the Democratic National Committee, Warner started ventures in energy and real estate, but really hit it big in telecommunications. He convinced some investors to help him purchase cellular telephone licenses the government was selling for a relative song in the early 1980s and then staked a big and early claim in Nextel, which soon blossomed into one of the biggest wireless service providers. It was swallowed by Sprint Corp. a decade ago, by which point Warner had been state party chairman, staged one closer-than-expected bid for the Senate, had been elected governor and was being touted as a prime presidential prospect. Instead, he cruised into the Senate six years ago on a “radical centrist” platform and is the clear but not quite prohibitive favorite to win his second term this fall.
After big gains in his personal fortune the previous year, Warner’s net worth stayed flat in 2013. His minimum net worth decreased by $1 million since last year — a miniscule fraction of the $95.1 million total. Warner has no liabilities, and his assets remain largely tied up in blind trusts for the benefit of his family — portfolios over which he has no control and minimal awareness of the assets or transactions. The MRW Blind Trust is for the senator’s benefit. The LDC Blind Trust is for the benefit of his wife, Lisa Collis. Their children also have several hundred thousand dollars worth of assets in their trusts.
The senator’s most valuable investments are worth more than $5 million each. All five are part of his blind trust.
Warner sits on the board of directors of The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He is also on the board of the Collis Warner Foundation, Inc., the family's charitable arm run by his wife. He reports no earned income from either position.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $4.94M |
Real estate | $0.00M |
Trusts | $88.91M |
Bank accounts | $1.28M |
6.Rep. Jared Polis
D-Colo.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #6 | $73.56M | $80.09M | $6.53M |
Previous year | #7 | $68.13M | $74.64M | $6.51M |
Change | 1 | 7.97% | 7.30% | 0.23% |
The Colorado Democrat's assets include stakes of at least $1 million in the world’s only aquaculture venture capital firm, Aquacopia; the Colorado Internet startup Confluence Commons Inc. (to which he also extended a line of credit worth at least $5 million) and the AIP Japan Fund V, which invests in senior housing in that country. Polis also has a blind trust worth at least $25 million that he set up after being elected to Congress. It delivered more than $1 million of income last year.
Diverse real estate investments in Colorado and Japan yielded at least $480,000 in additional income. And Polis benefited from the run-up in the value of stock in the ride-share company Uber Inc., with a stake now worth at least $500,000.
Polis reported more than $6.5 million in liabilities, including a Merrill Lynch line of credit worth at least $5 million.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $31.67M |
Real estate | $20.80M |
Trusts | $25.00M |
Bank accounts | $2.62M |
7.Sen. Richard Blumenthal
D-Conn.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #7 | $62.06M | $62.56M | $0.50M |
Previous year | #4 | $85.32M | $85.82M | $0.50M |
Change | -3 | -27.26% | -27.10% | 0.00% |
Blumenthal's 2013 filing is speckled with private equity and hedge fund holdings. There's also a real estate company in Sao Paulo, Brazil, multiple properties in midtown Manhattan and entities that leased and operated the Empire State Building. Blumenthal additionally lists at least $600,000 worth of gold held at JPMorgan.
The senator receives an annual pension for his 20 years of service as Connecticut’s attorney general before being elected in 2010, and he reported a single mortgage of $500,001 to $1 million as a liability.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $28.97M |
Real estate | $22.91M |
Trusts | $4.82M |
Bank accounts | $5.86M |
8.Rep. Scott Peters
D-Calif.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #8 | $45.04M | $45.11M | $0.07M |
Previous year | #8 | $44.74M | $49.87M | $5.13M |
Change | 0 | 0.68% | -9.55% | -98.73% |
That’s thanks in part to the investments he made with the millions he earned as an environmental attorney in the 1990s representing businesses and government agencies in their regulatory disputes. But it’s also because his wife, Lynn Gorguze, has been successful at the helm of Cameron Holdings, a private equity firm focused on manufacturing enterprises established by her father, former Emerson Electric executive Vincent Gorguze. She holds at least $14 million in assets, mainly investments in mutual funds and manufacturing companies.
Peters, who’s in a tossup race for a second term in one of California’s most politically competitive districts, has so far donated about $72,000 to his campaign. He invested almost $3 million to oust GOP incumbent Brian Bilbray in 2012, and Peters clearly has the resources to spend that much and more this fall. He continues to invest heavily in municipal bonds, with $12.5 million in paper issued all across his home state, along with notes issued by local governments in nine other states and Puerto Rico.
The congressman also reported $21,000 in pension payments from the City of San Diego, where he was a councilman for eight years and a port commissioner for four years. He donated the retirement nest egg to the city’s public library.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $43.59M |
Real estate | $0.00M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $1.52M |
9.Sen. Dianne Feinstein
D-Calif.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #9 | $43.72M | $43.72M | $0.00M |
Previous year | #9 | $41.67M | $43.67M | $2.00M |
Change | 0 | 4.91% | 0.11% | -100.00% |
Feinstein's a classic case of one of the biggest faults in the reporting requirements: assets in Blum's name may be reported in a broad category of more than $1 million, so the calculated minimum net worth may be a significant understatement.
Blum's assets include holdings in Current Media, the company headed by former Vice President Al Gore that was sold to Al Jazeera. He has significant holdings through Blum Capital Partners in an array of businesses, including the Carlton Hotel chain and OZ Fitness.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $36.25M |
Real estate | $1.00M |
Trusts | $6.35M |
Bank accounts | $0.12M |
10.Rep. Suzan DelBene
D-Wash.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #10 | $37.89M | $37.89M | $0.00M |
Previous year | #16 | $23.91M | $23.91M | $0.00M |
Change | 6 | 58.48% | 58.48% | 0.00% |
The Washington Democrat reported a minimum of $37.9 million in assets in 2014. That's $14 million more than last year, when the freshman lawmaker first landed on the list. She is the second wealthiest woman in Congress and is tops among first-term, female lawmakers.
She and her husband, Kurt, who left Microsoft last year and now oversees the federal government’s online health care enrollment website, healthcare.gov, made at least $2.5 million last year by selling off their remaining stock in the technology giant. Not surprisingly, Kurt DelBene returned his federal salary to the U.S. Treasury.
The largest new asset the couple listed is their main residence worth at least $5 million in Medina, Wash., a tony enclave just outside of Seattle whose most famous resident is Microsoft founder Bill Gates. They do not hold a mortgage on the property.
Most of their other assets are spread across a variety of investment accounts, including two funds worth at least $5 million apiece. They also have several million dollars invested in both university and municipal bonds.
DelBene lists no liabilities.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $27.89M |
Real estate | $5.00M |
Trusts | $5.00M |
Bank accounts | $0.00M |
11.Rep. Vern Buchanan
R-Fla.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #11 | $37.15M | $58.30M | $21.15M |
Previous year | #12 | $31.65M | $58.60M | $26.95M |
Change | 1 | 17.39% | -0.51% | -21.52% |
In a year, Buchanan paid off a significant portion of the mortgage on his purchase of Lear Jet, Aircraft Holding & Leasing, LLC., decreasing the liability from $5 million to $1 million. He also closed a million-dollar line of credit at Bank of America used for one of his car dealerships, bringing down his liability total and subsequently increasing his minimum net worth.
Buchanan saw some other financial changes in 2013. He sold $2 million of hedge fund investments and a $1 million property in Florida. Buchanan also saw an investment in a Michigan apartment building increase in value from at least $1 million in 2012 to at least $5 million in 2013.
Despite some sizable transactions, the total value of the his assets remains relatively unchanged compared with 2012. Buchanan’s assets are still divided between investments and real estate holdings.
Buchanan’s financial disclosure report revealed he is a partner in or managing member of 35 organizations, which are mainly real estate entities. Buchanan remains a managing member of his automotive group, which helped build his fortune.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $35.51M |
Real estate | $22.78M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $0.02M |
12.Rep. Chellie Pingree
D-Maine
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #12 | $34.47M | $36.47M | $2.00M |
Previous year | #11 | $34.45M | $36.47M | $2.02M |
Change | -1 | 0.05% | 0.01% | -0.74% |
Pingree and her husband, investment guru Donald Sussman, saw little change in their financial picture — with nearly $34.5 million minimum net worth, almost $36.5 million in combined assets and $2 million of debt — over the past 12 months. Sussman maintains a steady revenue stream that includes seven-figure paydays from no less than a half-dozen prominent hedge funds, real estate ventures and various international organizations, while also juggling less rewarding enterprises (including Maine’s Own Organic Milk, Maine Today Media holdings and a pair of struggling property development projects).
Pingree, meanwhile, has consolidated the power base she established a decade ago with the opening of Nebo Lodge — which has since garnered nationwide attention from prestigious food and travel outlets — by expanding her hospitality empire to include seasonal “barn dinners” at her nearby home, Turner Farm. Her youngest daughter, Cecily Pingree, bolstered the family-run dining portfolio by launching a companion eatery, Calderwood Hall Pizza earlier this summer.
Should any of her projects need a shot in the arm, Pingree can tap into the more than $1 million she has parked in a personal account with JPMorgan Chase & Co. Then again, she doesn’t appear to spend her cash all willy-nilly.
Pingree allowed the Embassy of Turkey to pick up the tab for a 5-day trip to Istanbul she took last spring.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $28.25M |
Real estate | $5.00M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $3.22M |
13.Rep. Gary G. Miller
R-Calif.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #13 | $32.97M | $33.47M | $0.50M |
Previous year | #20 | $17.81M | $17.81M | $0.00M |
Change | 7 | 85.09% | 87.90% | 0.00% |
This will be the Californian’s final appearance on the list of wealthiest members. He’s leaving this fall after eight terms, where he’s risen to be a senior Republican on both the Financial Services and Transportation committees, having concluded that his recently redrawn House district in San Bernardino County’s Inland Empire was too reliably Democratic for him to survive.
Miller got into the business of developing commercial and residential real estate after dropping out of community college in 1970, and he’d made enough of a fortune by 1998 that he was able to finance his bid to oust an ethically tarnished GOP incumbent in the primary. He’s been among the most well-off members ever since.
His first partnership, with a building contractor to bid on federal contracts to improve housing for the poor, led Miller to start building single-family homes and, later, developing planned communities. His two most ambitious recent ventures — in which his stakes grew last year to between $5 million and $25 million (up from the $1 million to $5 million range) — are both subdivisions at the eastern edge of the Cascade Mountains in Bend, Ore. Miller also owns rental houses, residential lots, commercial tracts and stakes in other developments in and adjacent to that picturesque boomtown. That portfolio was worth at least $11 million, but potentially as much as $51 million, and that was after selling 19 houses and twice as many buildable lots in 2013.
Bend is 850 miles from the congressman’s home town of Rancho Cucamonga, where his most prominent holdings are a 385-acre ranch, ripe for development and worth between $4 million and $20 million, and a handful of industrial lots worth $1 million to $5 million. He’s also holding onto a pair of one-acre residential lots (worth at least $1 million each) in the Los Angeles suburb of Diamond Bar.
The congressman also holds a handful of relatively small positions in investment funds. His only liability is a line of credit, on which he owes a minimum of $500,000, taken out last year.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $0.72M |
Real estate | $31.35M |
Trusts | $0.25M |
Bank accounts | $1.15M |
14.Rep. Nancy Pelosi
D-Calif.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #14 | $29.01M | $42.36M | $13.35M |
Previous year | #15 | $24.45M | $38.80M | $14.35M |
Change | 1 | 18.65% | 9.18% | -6.97% |
The boost in the House minority leader's personal finances is, in part, attributable to stock investments associated with her husband that grew significantly over the course of a year. Paul Pelosi's investment in Comcast, for instance, doubled between 2012 and 2013, from at least $250,000 to at least $500,000. Meanwhile, his stake in a real estate development project in Sacramento, Calif., skyrocketed from at least $1 million to at least $5 million.
Paul Pelosi also sold off a commercial property he owned in San Anselmo, Calif., which he had a mortgage of at least $1 million on in 2012.
The couple's joint investments, which are few, are primarily in California real estate. They include a vineyard worth at least $5 million that generated at least $100,000 in income from grape sales last year.
In 2013, Pelosi maintained her affiliations with a number of boards, institutions and associations, including the U.S. Botanic Garden, the Kennedy Center and the Women & Politics Institute at American University. She also added another non-paid position to the mix, joining the board of the Close Up Foundation, which states its mission as "informing, inspiring, and empowering young people to exercise the rights and accept the responsibilities of citizens in a democracy."
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $32.72M |
Real estate | $8.60M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $1.03M |
15.Rep. James B. Renacci
R-Ohio
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #15 | $28.08M | $29.08M | $1.00M |
Previous year | #10 | $35.90M | $36.90M | $1.00M |
Change | -5 | -21.77% | -21.18% | 0.00% |
The Pennsylvania native started out as an accountant in Pittsburgh before settling in Wadsworth, Ohio, to launch his own accounting business and invest in a chain of nursing homes. He later served as mayor of the town before running for Congress in 2010.
He's invested in professional sports teams, including a failed venture into the Arena Football League as part owner and general manager of the now-defunct Columbus Destroyers. However, Renacci continues to hold at least a $100,000 stake in the Lancaster, Calif.-based JetHawks, a minor-league baseball team.
He also owns real estate in several Ohio towns including Canton, Alliance, Louisville and Wadsworth. He purchased a Washington, D.C., property for at least $1 million in June 2013. Renacci's stake (at least $500,000) in Harley Davidson dealerships stayed the same after increasing in 2012. He is still owed a personal loan from his campaign worth at least $250,000.
Renacci reported only one liability, a line of credit worth at least $100,000 that he ended up paying off in full last year.
He once again disclosed the precise value of many assets instead of reporting them in broad ranges. His report of assets, liabilities and transactions runs to 447 pages.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $23.70M |
Real estate | $3.70M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $1.68M |
16.Rep. Roger Williams
R-Texas
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #16 | $28.01M | $31.52M | $3.51M |
Previous year | #63 | $5.33M | $7.68M | $2.35M |
Change | 47 | 425.75% | 310.55% | 49.36% |
The biggest chunk of his nest egg — Williams has a minimum net worth of approximately $28 million, with assets totaling around $31.5 million while carrying around $3.5 million in debt — is the eponymous JRW Corporation & Affiliates (estimated value: at least $25 million). Additional revenue streams in from assorted automobile dealerships, as well as a car-washing venture.
Williams collected another $50,000-plus from his stake in Quintana Energy Partners, an investment fund focusing on fossil fuels. His wife, Patty, kept busy by putting in hours at one of the family’s car dealerships. She also drew a paycheck from PK Flowers Interiors, Inc., a home designer offering services ranging from by-the-hour consultations to full-scale remodeling.
The couple has at least two fashionable places to hang their hats: their million-plus dollar home in Weatherford, Texas, and a $1 million-plus vacation spot just outside the city of Marble Falls, Texas. Williams borrowed more than $250,000 in 2012 to carve out a place for he and his wife at Horseshoe Bay Resort, a tony Texas community that boasts four professionally designed golf courses, a yacht club and dedicated spa.
In addition to the lakeside property, Williams has indulged his collector’s eye by amassing $1 million-plus in “sports memorabilia,” “political and military artifacts” and “historical documents,” as well as traditional art and photographs. He’s also tucked away at least $250,000 in an irrevocable trust for his children.
The guy is also quite the giver — to himself, anyway.
He’s owed upwards of $250,000 from his congressional campaign and one of his corporate holdings. Williams Chrysler Dodge Jeep, meanwhile, is on the hook to him for north of a cool million.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $2.79M |
Real estate | $28.40M |
Trusts | $0.25M |
Bank accounts | $0.08M |
17.Rep. Alan Grayson
D-Fla.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #17 | $26.18M | $31.68M | $5.50M |
Previous year | #21 | $16.69M | $22.79M | $6.10M |
Change | 4 | 56.88% | 39.02% | -9.84% |
Grayson founded the Grayson Fund Management Co. after losing his first re-election bid in 2010, a career change that allowed him to dive into asset management. His stake in the firm is worth at least $5 million, according to his financial disclosure report. His portfolio also includes at least $1 million of stock in Collectors Universe, which authenticates coins, sports cards, autographs and stamps; the aviation leasing firm Fly Leasing; and Northern Tier Energy. Other significant holdings are in drugstore chain CVS and Russia’s second-biggest oil company, Lukoil. Grayson also reported more than $1.25 million of options in China Mobile.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $25.13M |
Real estate | $0.00M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $6.55M |
18.Rep. Chris Collins
R-N.Y.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #18 | $22.50M | $22.50M | $0.00M |
Previous year | #17 | $22.26M | $22.26M | $0.00M |
Change | -1 | 1.05% | 1.05% | 0.00% |
Before coming to Congress in 2012, Collins was a successful businessman who used his management experience during a term as Erie County executive and his financial disclosure reflects his ties to Western New York.
Collins has significant investments in local companies including $5 million in Volland Electric in Buffalo, N.Y. He also has investments worth at least $5 million dollars in Buffalo's ZeptoMetrix Corporation, which is a biotechnology organization that focuses on infectious diseases and the immune system.
However, geography isn’t Collins’ only link to those particular companies. He worked for both ZeptoMetrix and Volland in the past and his wife, Mary Sue, is listed as receiving income from those two groups. However, Collins did not report his wife’s exact income, since House rules stipulate that for spouses, only the source and type of income must be disclosed.
The biotech investments also expand overseas, most notably to Innate Immunotherapeutics, a biotech company that develops technology that applies to the human immune system in an effort to combat certain cancers and diseases. In 2012, Collins invested in the company’s New Zealand offices. Collins expanded that investment in 2013 to the company’s Australia offices, purchasing $3 million in Innate Immunotherapeutics stock.
Collins’ investment in the biotech industry is well suited for his congressional subcommittee assignments. He is a member of the Agriculture Subcommittee on Horticulture, Research, Biotechnology and Foreign Agriculture. He also chairs the Small Business Subcommittee on Health and Technology.
For the second year in a row, Collins reported no liabilities.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $18.97M |
Real estate | $1.42M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $2.12M |
19.Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen
R-N.J.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #19 | $22.21M | $22.21M | $0.00M |
Previous year | #18 | $20.91M | $20.91M | $0.00M |
Change | -1 | 6.23% | 6.23% | 0.00% |
Nine years ago, he was pegged the 11th richest member, but his wealth relative to his colleagues started slipping soon after. After coming in at 16 on 2012's list and landing at 18 last year, he has dropped another place, in part because the value floor for his expansive stock and real estate portfolio declined 17 percent to $17.3 million from $20.9 million.
A more public change for him came last November, when he was named chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee after the death of Florida Rep. C.W. Bill Young. The subcommittee takes the lead for the House in apportioning to the military slightly more of federal discretionary spending every year.
Frelinghuysen, along with half a dozen family trusts, maintains positions in more than 100 health care, technology, energy, financial services and consumer products companies. None is among the biggest defense contractors, but he owns between $50,000 and $100,000 worth of General Electric, which is providing more than $2 billion in communications systems to the Pentagon this year, and between $100,000 and $250,000 of Federal Express, which does at least $1 billion in annual deliveries for the military. He holds stock in at least a dozen other businesses that sell goods and services to the Defense Department and other government agencies.
About a third of his wealth, at least $6 million, is in the Proctor & Gamble stock he’s inherited. His mother, born Beatrice Sterling Procter, was a descendent of one of the personal care conglomerate’s founders.
Frelinghuysen also has more than $1 million invested in IBM and with the Daily Income Fund, a money market. He’s got at least that much in his checking account at a bank that caters to the high-net-worth residents in New Jersey’s horse country. And he’s got land worth about $600,000 at the outer edge of the New York suburbs and in the Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts. Frelinghuysen reported no liabilities.
The congressman’s investments will gain additional scrutiny if, as expected, he becomes chairman of the Appropriations Committee in 2017. Kentucky Republican Harold Rogers will have reached his three-term limit then. Next year, Frelinghuysen will be second in majority party seniority and he remains safely ensconced in a district that covers many of the wealthiest and best-educated communities in the state, where his family has been a political force since the Revolution. When he arrived in the House in 1995, he became the sixth Frelinghuysen in Congress.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $20.56M |
Real estate | $0.60M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $1.05M |
20.Rep. Diane Black
R-Tenn.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #20 | $21.24M | $32.24M | $11.00M |
Previous year | #14 | $24.94M | $34.44M | $9.50M |
Change | -6 | -14.85% | -6.40% | 15.79% |
Part of the shortfall is attributable to a change in value of certain stock investments owned by Black's husband. The couple jointly listed a higher debt in 2013 than they did in 2012 — at least $11 million in mortgages on properties they own throughout Nashville, as compared to the $9.5 million minimum they listed the year before. Their initial rise in the wealth ranks since Black was elected to Congress in 2010 was also precipitated by the sale of her husband's forensic science company, Aegis Sciences Corp., to a New York private equity firm in late 2010.
But the second-term lawmaker still cleared the list's top 20 wealthiest lawmakers, thanks in part to continued, substantial investments in Tennessee real estate. All told, Black and her spouse jointly own least $19 million worth of properties throughout Nashville, plus a home in Panama City, Fla., with a minimum value of $250,000.
Black's husband, David, also lists numerous and significant stocks connected to Aegis, which began as a "sports anti-doping laboratory at Vanderbilt University" that the couple founded and where he still serves as president and chief executive officer.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $12.99M |
Real estate | $19.25M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $0.00M |
21.Rep. Joseph Kennedy III
D-Mass.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #21 | $20.00M | $20.83M | $0.83M |
Previous year | #23 | $15.25M | $15.33M | $0.08M |
Change | 2 | 31.15% | 35.88% | 937.47% |
Kennedy, the son of former Rep. Joseph P. Kennedy II and grandson of Robert F. Kennedy, is worth nearly $20 million, most of it held in a series family trusts. He’s currently the only Kennedy in Congress, winning election in 2012 after working as a county prosecutor.
The trust holdings cover a wide-range of stocks spread across many sectors, among them Exxon, General Electric, Disney, McDonald's, Google and Coca Cola. His disclosure lists a few dozen stock market transactions over the past year, but none valued at more than $50,000.
Kennedy, who debuted on the list as the 23rd richest lawmaker last year, moved up a spot this year as his wealth grew by more than $3.5 million as the stock market continued to rise.
His largest liabilities are mortgages he holds with his wife, Lauren Anne Birchfield, in Massachusetts and Washington, D.C., on personal residences. The couple owes at least $500,000 on the mortgage for their property in the District, while the mortgage on their Bay State home is about half that.
Like last year, Kennedy lists about $80,000 in student loans owed by his wife. Birchfield, who he met in law school at Harvard, works for the National Partnership for Women and Families but does not list a salary. She also received a $31,000 consulting fee from Boston Medical Center.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $0.72M |
Real estate | $0.00M |
Trusts | $18.97M |
Bank accounts | $1.13M |
22.Sen. Jim Risch
R-Idaho
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #22 | $19.24M | $19.79M | $0.55M |
Previous year | #19 | $19.18M | $19.74M | $0.56M |
Change | -3 | 0.31% | 0.25% | -1.79% |
His net worth increased about $100,000 to a minimum of $19.2 million, but he dropped a few slots on the list as members with stock-driven investments saw their portfolios grow faster.
Risch’s largest holdings are ranch and farm lands in southwest Idaho, including three parcels worth at least $5 million apiece. He collects at least $5,000 annually on each of the properties in royalty and rent payments.
Risch sits on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, where he has sought to look out for the interest of Western landowners. In particular, Risch opposes the federal reintroduction and protection of gray wolves in the West that have killed calves on some of his land.
Additionally, Risch owns several commercial properties and is involved with several real estate partnerships, including an office building in Boise that he collected at least $5,000 in rent on last year.
Like past years, Risch also reports more than $250,000 in outstanding notes from his 2002 GOP primary campaign for lieutenant governor, which he won.
Risch also owns a condominium in Washington, D.C., worth at least $250,000.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $2.82M |
Real estate | $16.92M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $0.05M |
23.Sen. Bob Corker
R-Tenn.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #23 | $19.12M | $19.12M | $0.00M |
Previous year | #22 | $16.68M | $18.68M | $2.00M |
Change | -1 | 14.65% | 2.37% | -100.00% |
The lion’s share of Corker’s wealth comes from several real estate investments, including The Volunteer Building in Chattanooga, Tenn., which was valued at a least $5 million. Corker owned a construction company, then became a real estate developer before ultimately being elected mayor of Chattanooga. He was later courted to run for the Senate by former Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn.
Corker also reported at least a $5 million interest in Pointer (QP) LP, a private investment partnership also based in Chattanooga. He also disclosed a $1 million investment in Gerber Taylor Partners and $1 million in Gerber Taylor Global Hedge L.P., both investment funds based in Memphis.
Corker reported no liabilities. Last year he listed a pair of mortgages connected to his Corker Properties Ltd. that were worth at least $1 million apiece and date to 1998.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $12.50M |
Real estate | $5.52M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $1.10M |
24.Sen. Claire McCaskill
D-Mo.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #24 | $18.38M | $18.93M | $0.55M |
Previous year | #24 | $14.93M | $15.23M | $0.30M |
Change | 0 | 23.09% | 24.28% | 83.33% |
Most of her wealth stems from her husband, Joseph Shepard. The St. Louis businessman primarily made his fortune developing affordable housing and nursing homes around the nation.
Shepard reported three transactions of more than $1 million, including a sale related to the New Zealand-based Fisher Funds. The other two transactions were purchases. McCaskill also reported receiving $70,000 from Simon & Schuster for a yet to be titled book.
Shepard’s wealth became a topic of interest during McCaskill's last campaign, particularly over government subsidies he received in connection with his development business.
Shepard’s assets include a minimum of $1 million each in Missouri and Georgia House Tax Credit Funds. He also has at least $1 million each invested in The Terrace Apartments and The Lockwood Group, a development firm.
Shepard is also listed as holding at least $1 million worth of Berkshire Hathaway Class A shares, which sell for just over $200,000 each. He also holds at least $15,001 of the Class B shares. Berkshire Hathaway is a U.S.-based conglomerate owned by billionaire investor Warren Buffett. Buffett’s concern that his secretary paid a higher tax rate than he did became a principle — known as the Buffett Rule — pushed by Democrats that everyone should pay their "fair share" in taxes.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $10.22M |
Real estate | $8.62M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $0.08M |
25.Rep. Tom Petri
R-Wis.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #25 | $15.64M | $16.24M | $0.60M |
Previous year | #36 | $9.91M | $11.01M | $1.10M |
Change | 11 | 57.81% | 47.50% | -45.45% |
Of course, much of that growth may be attributable to how his assets are counted on his financial disclosure, but Petri has made some savvy, if not controversial, investments.
Petri is currently the subject of an Ethics Committee investigation due to his ownership of more than $500,000 in the Oshkosh Corp. The defense contractor, which resides in Petri’s district, has seen sharp stock gains thanks in part to Pentagon contracts that Petri advocated for.
Petri’s financial disclosure, which is in many places almost illegible, also lists more than $5 million in stock in U.S. Bank and Walgreens.
Petri’s liabilities include a mortgage of more than $100,000 and a loan from Merrill Lynch of more than $500,000, which is down from $1 million from last year.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $16.20M |
Real estate | $0.02M |
Trusts | $0.02M |
Bank accounts | $0.02M |
26.Rep. Richard Hanna
R-N.Y.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #26 | $15.30M | $15.32M | $0.02M |
Previous year | #25 | $14.38M | $14.40M | $0.02M |
Change | -1 | 6.43% | 6.42% | -0.01% |
Hanna holds at least $250,000 in PepsiCo and a minimum of $500,000 in Chevron. His Fidelity money market account is worth a minimum of $500,000, a decrease from last year. His real estate assets include Gabriel Group LLC., in Utica, N.Y.
Held jointly with his wife, Hanna has a minimum of $20,000 in liabilities owed to Chase and American Express.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $13.15M |
Real estate | $2.00M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $0.17M |
27.Sen. John McCain
R-Ariz.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #27 | $15.17M | $15.32M | $0.15M |
Previous year | #57 | $6.32M | $9.77M | $3.45M |
Change | 30 | 139.94% | 56.81% | -95.79% |
The McCain fortune is almost entirely thanks to the senator’s wife, Cindy. For the past two decades, she has been the controlling stockholder in Hensley & Co., which her father, Jim, started in a quite sleepy Arizona in the 1950s but which has grown to become the largest beverage distributor in the burgeoning state as well as the third-largest Anheuser-Busch distributor in the country.
The senator’s minimum net worth more than doubled in the past year, to $15.1 million, because of significant gains in the McCain investments and big time reductions in the couple’s debts.
Their assets increased more than 35 percent because of a newly established portfolio of Charles Schwab accounts, held in Cindy McCain’s name, worth at least $3.4 million, along with four notes receivable from various McCain family trusts worth at least $3.25 million. On the other side of the ledger, Cindy McCain repaid more than $3.4 million in virtually interest-free promissory notes owed to the family business. That left as the couple’s only liabilities balances totaling more than $145,000 on a quartet of her credit cards.
That improved picture marked a big financial rebound for McCain, who had seen his millions shrink steadily since he last ran for president. His net worth was at least $20 million just six years ago, when he was the 13th wealthiest member of Congress.
His family money became an issue that year, when he conceded he couldn’t recall how many houses he owned. Democrats, led by their nominee Barack Obama, took delight in labeling that memory lapse as evidence McCain was way out of touch with the economic concerns of everyday Americans. The senator’s most recent disclosures makes that tally more clear. The couple still owns at least five residences: Their voting home in Phoenix, three properties in luxurious neighborhoods in southern California and the family’s picturesque getaway between Sedona and Cottonwood, Ariz., the ranch where McCain interviewed then-Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska to be his running mate.
Beyond his Senate salary and some royalties for his books, the only income McCain added to the 2013 ledger was his $71,000 pension from his quarter-century in the Navy.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $9.57M |
Real estate | $1.23M |
Trusts | $4.37M |
Bank accounts | $0.15M |
28.Sen. John Hoeven
R-N.D.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #28 | $15.16M | $16.16M | $1.00M |
Previous year | #26 | $14.21M | $15.21M | $1.00M |
Change | -2 | 6.66% | 6.23% | 0.00% |
The North Dakotan’s two largest holdings are the same as in 2013: at least $5 million in stock of Westbrand Inc. Bank Holding Co., based in Minot, N.D., that produced at least $100,000 in dividends, and at least $5 million in the Minnesota medical equipment company Northwest Respiratory Services LLC, which produced $2.3 million in income.
Hoeven is an active trader and holds an array of blue-chip stocks, including at least $100,000 in McDonald's, Microsoft, Intel, Johnson and Johnson, General Mills and Coca-Cola stock. He has a financial interest in high-end fashion with at least $100,000 in Coach stock and $50,000 in Ralph Lauren stock. And closer to his North Dakota roots, the Senate Agriculture Committee member owns at least $100,000 in John Deere stock.
His largest investment over the past year was $500,000 in Mainstream Investors LLC, a North Dakota company created in 2012 to provide capital for the state’s exploding oil and national gas production operations. He also made at least $100,000 when Berkshire Hathaway acquired HJ Heinz and brought out its stockholders.
Hoeven remains a director of the First Western Bank in Minot where he began his banking career in the 1980s. He’s due to receive a monthly pension of $837.74 from the bank when he retires and still maintains a checking account there with at least a million dollars in it.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $15.16M |
Real estate | $0.00M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $1.00M |
29.Rep. Curt Clawson
R-Fla.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #29 | $13.53M | $13.80M | $0.27M |
Previous year | n/a | |||
Change | -29 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
Other holdings include at least $500,000 in Clawson Investments LLC, which invests in Endocyte Inc., a biotech company, and at least $500,000 in the Widsomtree Japan Hedge Equity Fund, which has positions in companies including Toyota Motor Corp. and Mitsubishi Financial Group. The lawmaker's portfolio also includes at least $500,000 in New York city and state bonds. Clawson's liabilities include a margin account with Deutsche Bank worth at least $250,000.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $11.82M |
Real estate | $1.77M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $0.22M |
30.Sen. Ron Johnson
R-Wis.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #30 | $13.52M | $13.52M | $0.00M |
Previous year | #29 | $12.47M | $12.47M | $0.00M |
Change | -1 | 8.36% | 8.36% | 0.00% |
Johnson's single biggest asset is a money market account at Charles Schwab worth between $5 million and $25 million. He maintains a $1 million to $5 million stake in Pacur Inc., a plastics manufacturer he launched with his brother-in-law that's involved in medical device packaging and high-tech printing applications.
Johnson also has a 9.9 percent ownership stake worth between $250,000 and $500,000 in DPLenticular Ltd., a 3D printing business based in Ireland.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $7.67M |
Real estate | $5.10M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $0.75M |
31.Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner
R-Wis.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #31 | $13.04M | $13.04M | $0.00M |
Previous year | #32 | $10.99M | $10.99M | $0.00M |
Change | 1 | 18.57% | 18.57% | 0.00% |
Sensenbrenner, who’s spent the maximum permissible six years in the top GOP seat on both the Judiciary and Science committees, is among the relatively few members who disclose more about their finances than the Hill’s rules require. He provides hundreds of pages of down-to-the-penny detail about his diversified portfolio of securities and their performances as part of 14 different family trusts. The records show the worth of his investments grew by 18 percent, or $2 million, in the past year, to just above $13 million. (Had he stuck with the ranges of value on the House forms, his minimum net worth would have looked to be a little more than half as much and he might not appear on the 50 Richest roster.)
Two trusts, created to benefit Sensenbrenner’s now-adult sons, hold a combined $2.3 million in stock issued by Kimberly-Clark and a pair of its spinoffs. The other trusts have no holdings in the family business. Instead, the congressman’s biggest stakes, worth $500,001 to $1 million, are shares in AbbVie, Exxon Mobil, Pfizer and Philip Morris.
Sensenbrenner supplemented his congressional salary with $45,000 in fees as a trustee of the family holdings and a $31,000 pension from his decade in the Wisconsin legislature. He also reported spending three recess weeks overseas (in Seoul, Tel Aviv and Munich) on educational trips paid for by nonprofits seeking to promote international good will.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $6.92M |
Real estate | $0.00M |
Trusts | $6.11M |
Bank accounts | $0.00M |
32.Sen. Mitch McConnell
R-Ky.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #32 | $11.97M | $11.97M | $0.00M |
Previous year | #39 | $9.23M | $9.23M | $0.00M |
Change | 7 | 29.71% | 29.71% | 0.00% |
The Kentucky Republican’s reportable assets nearly tripled in 2008 thanks to a $5 million gift that he and his wife, former Labor Secretary Elaine L. Chao, received from her father, James, soon after the death of her mother. (After emigrating in the 1960s, the senator’s father-in-law founded a successful international trading business, now called the Foremost Group, specializing in importing Chinese-made goods to the United States.) The money has been invested ever since in a tax-exempt money market fund that remains the McConnells’ most significant asset by far.
The fact that McConnell has become so much better-off during his three decades in Congress has recently become an issue in his highly competitive re-election campaign. His Democratic challenger, Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes, aired a television ad in August alleging the incumbent had overstayed his welcome in the Senate by becoming “a multimillionaire in public office” while opposing minimum wage increases, fighting unemployment insurance extensions and supporting “tax breaks that send Kentucky jobs overseas.”
McConnell has not listed any liabilities for several years, and the bulk of the most recent increase in the value of his assets is attributable to investment gains by Chao. One of her mixed investment funds increased in value by at least $500,000, while the disclosure forms for the first time mentioned a pension investment fund in which she’s invested at least $500,000. Chao also received deferred compensation of at least $250,000 from Protective Life Corp., a life insurance business where she was on the board of directors.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $11.34M |
Real estate | $0.00M |
Trusts | $0.63M |
Bank accounts | $0.00M |
33.Sen. Tom Harkin
D-Iowa
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #33 | $11.85M | $11.85M | $0.00M |
Previous year | #30 | $11.88M | $11.88M | $0.00M |
Change | -3 | -0.22% | -0.22% | 0.00% |
Harkin himself owns very few assets — he has a bank account with Morgan Stanley worth between $1,001 and $15,001 and another in LPL Financial whose worth is in the same range. He also has three investments worth between $1,001 and $15,001.
Most of the assets belong to Harkin's wife, Ruth. The two most valuable assets are an investment in ConocoPhillips, and another in United Technology Corp., both owned by Ruth Harkin, each totaling at least $1 million. The Harkins made at least $100,000 in dividends on the ConocoPhillips investment, and at least $100,000 from an investment in Phillips 66.
Ruth Harkin was on the board of directors ConocoPhillips until last May. She previously served as senior vice president for international affairs and government relations for United Technologies and reported receiving a pension of at least $1,000 from the company this year.
She also earned at least $1,000 from Ireland’s National Toll Road as compensation for board membership, but does not currently hold any stock in the company.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
Investments | $10.77M |
Real estate | $0.50M |
Trusts | $0.00M |
Bank accounts | $0.58M |
34.Rep. Brad Schneider
D-Ill.
Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
---|---|---|---|---|
This year | #34 | $11.71M | $11.81M | $0.10M |
Previous year | #35 | $9.93M | $10.03M | $0.10M |
Change | 1 | 18.01% | 17.83% | 0.00% |
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